NASA Launches 2024 Proposal Solicitation for Tech Projects to Support Artemis, Mars Missions

NASA has announced that applications are now open for its 2024 solicitation of proposals from academic institutions, nonprofits and businesses on technologies that will support the agency’s Artemis moon missions and future Mars exploration.

Almost $1.5 million in NASA funding has already been awarded to 24 projects under the solicitation program dubbed Dual-Use Technology Development Cooperative Agreement Notices, or CANs. The projects, which were submitted by 21 organizations, will also receive professional assistance from the agency’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, NASA said Thursday.

The program opens NASA’s collaboration with U.S. industry and academia on the development of products to fill gaps in technologies, components and systems for the agency’s moon to Mars architecture, according to Daniel O’Neil, NASA Marshall’s CANs program manager.

The projects NASA has selected include methods to use lunar regolith for moon construction projects, finding alternative battery materials and tapping smartphone video control sensors to maneuver robots on the International Space Stations.

Two project submissions each from the Florida Institute of Technology, Northwestern University, and the University of Alabama have been awarded the NASA funding that could also advance commercial space ventures supporting NASA’s moon and Mars missions. 

In March, NASA also awarded five individuals grants from its Development and Advancement of Lunar Instrumentation project under the Lunar Discovery and Exploration Program that aims to develop technologies useful in future flight opportunities.